Wednesday, January 31, 2007

The Guardian has a worthy read and a bit more coyness from Raph Koster on Areae, web 2.0 and games:

I think a lot of what the game world can learn harkens back to the old cathedral and bazaar thing. Games are clearly cathedrals, as built right now. Each one is a moon shoot.

So with things like YASNS, indie development, etc. are games heading toward becoming the same kind of searchable, taggable data soup as other media? I think the entry barriers are still a bit too high, but that will change.

Practically everyone is a gamer — it’s really a question of what games they feel comfortable playing, be it bridge or Battlefield 2142.

Likewise everyone can be a game designer, but it depends what resources a person is comfortable using. Video games have an extensive heirarchy about them right now, from AAA to casual, but through the (admittedly balkanised) mod and homebrew communities, the overheads are slowly falling.